Necre Hearted Visitor

Comet 17/P Holmes 

Comet 17/P Holmes

I just couldn’t resist doing a quickie of this very unexpected object. As you may know, comet 17/P Holmes went from an unobscure magnitude 17 to 2.8 in just a little more than 24 hours…which it is now easily seen naked-eye in the constellation Perseus!! The coma is very bright and just a tad off-center, and the surrounding gases are emitting a slight off-yellow color. This comet does not (at present time) display the familiar “tail” that we are used to seeing with other comets, but this is still spectacular to see. Grab your scopes and head outside to see this beauty!!!

I will be observing this excellent and unexpected comet throughout the night and complete many sketches of this comet with differnt EP’s/magnifications. But for now, here is what it is looking like:

Wade V. Corbei
Lodi, California

A Promenade Through a Royale Garden

IC 1396 

IC1396, a promenade through the Royale Garden.

One of the known highlights of Cepheus is Mu Cephei, a deep orange star. This night Mu Cephei served as the guiding light to IC1396. This region is a beautiful field of stars. There was something peaceful about this place. I felt like strolling through an exotic garden covered with haze. The place seemed majesticaly silent with Mu Cephei as a guard of honour at the border of the eyepiece. I don’t know if I saw IC1396 at all. I just noted all the light I could absorb in this field. A strange fact is that Mu Cephei kept his orange color through the UHC filter.

Date : October 13, 2007
Time : 21.00UT
Scope : Skywatcher 102/500
Meade SP 26mm
Power : x20
FOV: 150′
Filter : Lumicon UHC
Seeing : 3.5/5
Transp. : 3/5
Nelm : 5.3
Sketch Orientation : N up, W right.
Digital sketch made with PhotoPaint, based on a raw pencil sketch.

Rony De Laet
Belgium

On the Tail of a Comet

Comet C/2007 Loneos

I had a few failed attempts at spotting comet C/2007 Loneos before we finally met.
  
  I caught up with it about 4 degrees below Arcturus in the evening twilight low in
the west to North western sky. With the Moon at around 50% on the eve of the 19th
October this didn’t help detection either. My village is in a hollow so to get a
good horizon I need to walk about half a mile along a track which runs up a hill
at the edge of the village ( Capon’s Hill). I used an old 6″ (150mm) F5 Helios
refractor on an alt-azimuth mount, slung it over my shoulder and set off. Equipped
with a couple of eyepieces and a BAA locator chart. I found it within a few
minutes of commencing the search. The tail was very hard to pick out in the orange
murk of the horizon although the head and coma with bright nucleus showed a hint
of a blue/green tinge. I nudged the scope to initiate movement and employed every
bit of averted vision I could must muster in an endeavour to detect what I felt
(at the time) to be a realistic interpretation.
  
  The eyepiece I used was a 22mm Nagler so I feel the tail in the sketch equates to
around 0.75 of a degree. I tried again the following evening and located the comet
with a little more difficulty but couldn’t detect the tail at all, the 65% Moon
had washed it away.
  
  Guess that I was lucky to have picked the interloper out when I did.
  
  Sketch made in a A6 sketch pad with a HB Derwent pencil and blending stump,

  scanned image turned into a negative in photo-shop.

Clear Skies,

Dale Holt,  England

Oddly Fascinating

M56 

Now here is a Globular that struck me as fascinating and odd at the same time. Although the stars resolved quite well, it also appeared very dim for as well as it resolved…strange.

The digital sketch based on my original pencil drawing took a little time to depict accurately. I was either getting it too bright or too dim, and getting to the point of making the digital sketch appear as it looked to me through the EP was a task. I believe I had 5 or 6 dufferent layers with differing opacities and Guassian Blurs applied before I got it to resemble the actual EP view.

This Globular is framed nicely by background stars of varying brightness, and set off this Globular quite nicely. Here is how it appeared to me through the EP, I hope you enjoy it.

Wade V. Corbei

Hiding In the Open

M33 

I found M33 a hard to find object in the past. I used to observe with long focal scopes. M33 never showed up in the eyepiece. Last year, I could finally detect the central part of this galaxy with my ETX105. This night, I was studying the milkyway in the Cygnus region with the Skywatcher for an hour or so. I wanted to end the observing session with a different type of object. I made a quick peek at M15 and M2 and then I turned my head to Andromeda and Triangulum. I aimed the scope to that spot where I could never find M33, just for fun. And there it was, in the middle of the low power eyepiece! I discovered the soft oval glow of M33. That was not so hard with this scope. I could not resist the urge to make a sketch of the scene. The Baader Contrast Booster filter joined in as well.

Date : October 13, 2007
Time : 22.00UT
Scope : Skywatcher 102/500
Meade SP 26mm
Power : x20
FOV: 150′
Filter : Baader Contrast Booster
Seeing : 3.5/5
Transp. : 3/5
Nelm : 5.4
Sketch Orientation : N up, W right.
Digital sketch made with PhotoPaint, based on a raw pencil sketch.

Rony De Laet
Belgium

Craters on the Sea of Islands

Reinhold

  Before sunset when I set up to sketch, the wind was howling out of the southwest.
The atmospheric disturbance continued through the nighttime hours and the seeing
remained poor all night. However, the sky was transparent and I set up in a part
of my yard that was most sheltered from the strongest wind gusts.

  I selected for sketching the craters on the floor of the lower Imbrian epoch Mare
Insularum. Basin ejecta debris could be seen strewn across much of the floor of
this sea.

  From southwest at the terminator is sharp rimmed, upper Imbrian crater Lansberg
(39 km.) totally shadow filled. Further to the northeast about 120 km. is
Eratosthenian aged crater Reinhold (48 km.). With some difficulty I was able to
make out some wall terracing on the western inner slope. A somewhat narrow rampart
was visible around the outer crater rim. East of Reinhold a short distance are the
craters Reinhold B (26 km.) with its flat floor and on its flat floor little
Reinhold A (4 km.) difficult to see most of this observation. On further to the
east the youngest crater in this sketch is 12 km. Gambart A. Some of its ejecta
were brightly visible superimposed on the maria’s darker lava. At the extreme
eastern corner of the sketch is old crater Gambart (25 km.) about the same size as
Reinhold A and like its twin, flat floored, shallow and lacking a central peak
which is uncharacteristic for craters in this size range.
  
  Sketching
  
  For this sketch I used: black Strathmore 400 Artagain paper, 9”x12”, white and
black Conte’ pastel pencils and a blending stump. Brightness was slightly
decreased after scanning.
  
  Telescope: 10 inch f/ 5.7 Dobsonian 6mm eyepiece 241x
  Date: 10-21-2007 0:05-1:40 UT
  Temperature: 16°C (62°F)
  Clear, very windy (30 mph)
  Transparency good
  Seeing: Antoniadi IV
  Co longitude: 27.3°
  Lunation:  9.8 days
  Illumination: 66.9 %
  
  Frank McCabe

Second Take

394 ARI 

394 ARI – Struve 394

394 ARI is a nice sight and contians a primary and secondary of almost equal size and magnitude with a primary with an obvious yellow tint and a secondary with an equally noticeable blue tint. This double stands fairly alone in the FOV at this magnification, but it is a very nice and easily observed double residing in Aries.

A New Dawn across the Bay of Rainbows

Bay of Rainbows 

  Northwest of the Sea of Rains is the 260 km. crater known as the Bay of Rainbows.
At the time of this evening observation the shadow of the terminator was crossing
the bay beyond 4 km. Heraclides E. A good one third of the bay floor was in
darkness but already Promontorium Heraclides and much taller Promontorium Laplace
across the bay were basking in the morning sunlight. A long triangular shadow from
the latter was seen extending westward. The sunlight was also descending the walls
of what remains of the crater rim known as the Jura mountains. My drawing does not
begin to capture the beauty of this view. East of the bay in the brightly
illuminated Imbrium basin are craters LeVerrier and Helicon both about 20 km. in
diameter. South of this pair are the much smaller craters Carlini and Carlini A.
  
  Sketching
  
  For this sketch I used:  White copy paper, 6”x 9”, 2H graphite pencil and an ink
  pen. Brightness was slightly increased after scanning.
  
  Telescope: 10 inch f/ 5.7 Dobsonian 12mm eyepiece 121x
  Date: 9-3-2006 0:30-1:15 UT
  Temperature: 20°C (68°F)
  Clear, calm
  Seeing:  Pickering 5/10
  Colongitude: 32.4°
  Lunation:  10.2 days
  Illumination: 71 %
  
  Frank McCabe

ET Phone Home

NGC 457

Here is my impression of NGC 457, a little funny guy that seems to swing through space with his arms stretched to get hold on some stars. The night was not very dark. The milkyway was only visible in the cygnus region. While centering the cluster, there appeared a small glowing patch to the north west. I did not know what it was, probably an anonimous grouping of stars. It turned out that the patch was NGC436, at about 40′ ! It came as a nice surprise.

Date : October 16, 2007
Time : 21.00UT
Scope : Skywatcher 102/500
Meade SP 26mm
Power : x20
FOV: 150′
Filter : none
Seeing : 3.5/5
Transp. : 3/5
Nelm : 5.1
Sketch Orientation : N up, W right.
Digital sketch made with PhotoPaint, based on a raw pencil sketch.

Rony De Laet
Belgium

http://www.geocities.com/rodelaet